Trai, Facebook face-off over differential pricing paper

Trai on Tuesday made a series of email exchanges with Facebook public on its website, in which it has called Facebook's Save Free basics campaign "crudely majoritarian and orchestrated opinion poll.Neha Alawadhi | ET Bureau | January 20, 2016, 08:10 IST

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India on Tuesday made a series of email exchanges with Facebook public on its website, in which it has called Facebook's Save Free basics campaign "crudely majoritarian and orchestrated opinion poll," raising the pitch and stakes of the larger net neutrality debate by several notches.

In a letter dated January 13, Ankhi Das, director Facebook public policy, India and South Asia, wrote to Trai saying that the regulator blocked the revised responses of Facebook users supporting its zero-rated service Free Basics.

Das has claimed that as many as 1.6 crore Facebook users sent emails to Trai supporting Free Basics, and as many as 40 lakhs of these answered the specific questions answered by the regulator.

"Despite this clear and timely effort by millions to send their comments, someone with access to the designated TRAI email account appears to have blocked the receipt of all emails to that TRAI account. Specifically, our inquiry revealed that on December 17 at 05:51:52 GMT, an individual with access to the TRAI email account designated to accept comments (advisorfea1trai.gov.in) took action that blocked Facebook from delivering any additional emails to that address," says Das in the letter, addressed to KV Sebastian, Joint Adviser, F&EA.

In response, Sebastian shot off an email to Facebook on January 18, saying that if Facebook's responses were indeed blocked by the Trai account on December 17, "TRAI should have been informed immediately for proper steps to be taken...It is surprising that it took over 25 days for you to inform TRAI of this."

Sebastian also pointed out a similar issue that was brought to Trai’s notice, and fixed, earlier in the consultation process.

On December 9, Facebook started a mass campaign on its platform asking users to support Free Basics, in response to a consultation paper on “differential pricing of data services” released by Trai.

As part of its campaign, Facebook urged its users to email Trai in support of “digital equality” and supporting Free Basics.

This was, however, done without addressing any of the questions posed in the paper, and on January 1, Trai asked Facebook to alert its users to send revised responses to the questions on the consultation paper, as a vote for Free Basics did not hold up as a valid response.

Facebook changed the text of its template submissions after this, but Trai has now questioned whether Facebook users were told that their earlier responses were invalid and a fresh submission would have to be made addressing the questions in the consultation paper. It further added that Facebook cannot speak on the behalf of its users, without first giving them precise information about the consultation process and submissions that they were making.

Further, Das in her letter from January 13 has also asserted that the template response sent by Facebook users supporting digital equality should be considered valid by Trai because the company believes "that the original comments submitted were responsive to the general questions raised in the consultation paper, which clearly covers such topics as the Free Basics program".

Sebastian in response, while assuring that all relevant comments and counter comments will be considered, said: "...it is crucial to underline that your continued assertion that the initial template responses sent by users through Facebook in support of 'digital equality' and 'Free Basics' are appropriate responses to the consultation paper, is wholly misplaced".